It's Less Easy Being 'Green' as Los Angeles Yanks Plug on Free Parking for Electric Cars

On a recent morning, Jack Luu parked his plug-in Toyota Prius in one of the most expensive lots at Los Angeles International Airport before flying off to a film shoot in Canada. The lot, where Mr. Luu leaves his car as many as 10 times a month for business trips, normally charges $30 a day.

But when Mr. Luu returned home three weeks later, he drove out, as usual, without paying a dime.

"That was a huge reason why I bought the car in the first place," says the 35-year-old Santa Monica, Calif., postproduction company executive, whose car qualifies for free parking for up to a month at a time in two of LAX's most convenient—and costly—short-term lots.

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Electric cars charging in one of the short-term lots LAX, where such vehicles are allowed to park free for 30 days.
Los Angeles World Airports

Other than that, he says his ride is "expensive, underpowered and not really all that green," because it can run just 12 miles on electricity before switching to gas.

For years, LAX has offered electric-vehicle owners one of the most generous incentives of its kind in the country: free parking for 30 days in two of its terminal lots, which contain, altogether, 38 charging stations. The rule was meant to encourage people to buy greener cars, but lately it has turned the lots into a mob scene, with some electric-vehicle drivers circling the stations desperately for electricity or running extension cords while others hog the charging spaces for weeks at a time.

Tension is rising between all-electric-car drivers, who say they actually need to charge their vehicles daily, and hybrid owners who can get away without doing so because their cars can run on gas as well.

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Jack Luu

Some electric-vehicle owners say the airport should expand its free-parking program to cover all eight of its short-term lots, not just the two with charging stations. Others want valets to ensure all the electric cars get to recharge.

But the airport announced on its website this week that electric-vehicle drivers will have to start paying normal parking fees in March, and began leaving warning fliers on parked electric cars.

"No one understands why we're doing this—especially in today's economy," says airport spokeswoman Nancy Castles, adding that not even handicapped travelers are allowed to park free of charge anymore. LAX is owned and operated by the city of Los Angeles.

More than a quarter of the country's 40,000-odd electric cars on the roads are located in Southern California according to Brett Williams, who directs electric-vehicle research at UCLA's Luskin School of Public Affairs, and "the single most congested situation is at LAX," he says. "I've never seen that many in one place outside of a formal event."

LAX started offering its parking incentive more than a decade ago, after California mandated that auto makers produce and sell zero-emission vehicles if they wanted to continue marketing in the state.

Initially, car makers leased the experimental models in small numbers to celebrities who could help create buzz before selling and extending leases to thousands of other drivers nationwide. But the 30-day-free-parking policy was largely forgotten after auto makers, saying they couldn't turn a profit on such models, canceled production and repossessed many of the cars.

Now, though, as consumers embrace electric vehicles with new gusto, the airport says its parking incentive has become unsustainable. If electric-vehicle drivers were to completely fill both lots that are free to them, the airport could lose $120,000 a day, totaling $44 million a year.

While no other major airport offers such a generous incentive, several cities offer free parking for electric cars in metered spaces. They include Las Vegas, Cincinnati, Salt Lake City, New Haven and San Antonio—all of which could eventually find themselves in binds similar to LAX's, since most municipalities rely heavily on parking revenue to support their budgets.

Revoking such benefits is a delicate task: When the City of London, home to much of Britain's financial industry, abruptly axed free electric-car parking in 2008, angry petitions circulated among drivers demanding the privilege be restored, arguing that many of them bought the small, expensive cars mainly to get the free parking.

Many of California's new electric-car owners say they, too, are counting on the free airport parking—trumpeted as a perk on electric vehicle makers' websites—to continue at least a few more years.

Alan Howard, a Los Angeles dentist who says he has only once been able to find a charging spot since he bought a Nissan Leaf last year, says making electric drivers pay for parking isn't the answer.

"I love it free—but they need to have some kind of system," he says. "Maybe a valet who can move the cars around."

Jack Sheng, an e-commerce-company owner who bought a Nissan Leaf last year, says electric vehicles should be able to park free in all eight lots, not just the two with charging stations.

"If they're trying to get people to drive green cars and reduce the pollution, shouldn't the policy be applicable to the whole terminal?" says Mr. Sheng, miffed that he had to pay to park recently while picking up a friend from an international flight.

John Anthony DiCiaccio, a 37-year-old engineer for Southwest AirlinesLUV-0.30% who bought a plug-in Toyota Prius partly because of the parking incentive, was distraught this week to read the flier left on his car warning that the free parking would be coming to an end.

He says he's still hopeful the airport could reverse course. "I know in my mind that this can't last forever, but I'm just crossing my fingers."

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